(no subject)

[arethinn]

jarandhel wondered this on another forum, and I found the question interesting and thought I'd ask it here.

Quite a few otherkin (not to mention human esoteric practitioners, but it's not the context of this question) claim to occasionally travel to the Otherworld, the astral, Faerie, and such places, or to spirit-walk to their own original home realms or planets (such as the Elenari and the worlds Alorya and Yyl'nectoir). That is, they do this now, at-will, rather than only having memories of the place. But he noted with curiosity that he couldn't think of any instances where he'd heard angel-kin talking about travelling to Heaven right now (despite having been a moderator of an angelkin list in the past), or demons to Hell, or to Limbo, Purgatory, or other similar "afterlife" kinds of places such as Valhalla or Hel (actually I have heard of people travelling to Hel, I think), the Elysian Fields or Hades, depending on the kin in question. (My own ideas on Tir na nOg or "the Summerland" are kind of mixed up now that I frame the question that way; they are not meaningful for me, but I'm trying to remember what I heard various elder sidhe/elven/etc types talk about back in the day, where "the day" is defined as the late 1990s. Anyway--)

So the question is, if you're one of those sorts of kin, do you regularly travel to the relevant associated place? Or is it somehow barred, or have you not tried?

My own answer was only this, which is really why I'm posting this question here, as it's not a very good answer at all and I'd be interested to see what others have to say on the subject:

Huh... you know, I'm not sure. I have vague recollections of angelics talking about Heaven, but nothing specific is leaping to mind and I think they were mostly in memory-mode, not access-now mode. (Maybe one of the problems of angel-kin is "generally, can't get back there right now"?) Demons and Hell... hum. Again, I feel like I want to say "oh yeah, I've heard some people talking about it somewhere" but I can't come up with any examples. Granted I don't talk to a lot of demons.

Maybe the beings that rule these realms are powerful enough that mere us-es can't breach the borders without invitation, and no invitations are forthcoming? Perhaps it's evidence of specific exile (rather than mistake, willing travel, or being sent)? I really don't know. Interesting question.

edit: I think I misled to describe these as "afterlife" realms. That may be what they are, but I think the real nature of the question is why does it seem that certain kintypes (e.g. elves and faery) have fairly easy current access to their "home" realm by spirit travel (there may of course be exceptions), while others (angels, demons) do not? At least, that was so in his observations, and my own mental poll said "hey yeah, I haven't heard people talk about that except as memories, not as a right-now kind of thing."

Comments

[all_adream]

Can't talk about the Judeo/Muslim/Christian versions of those places, but in Tibetan Buddhism, it is quite common for the capable to go to any of these realms, usually to help the beings there. Sometimes it happens in the time period when a person is 'temporarily dead', clinically dead for some days but comes back. The book by Tulku Thondup about "peaceful death, Joyful Rebirth" or similar name includes ten-twenty stories of this, right up to present day--

[all_adream]

The presumption is that you can't get in if you're not qualified, so to speak, which can include previous incarnations in those realms, or escort by a serious deity like Tara, but again, you need to have the merit/karma for it, which can include history there or with the beings involved.

[arethinn]

When you say "quite common", do you have a specific example? You yourself or someone else you know and can point to? I generalized from Jarin's original question (see the link he posted in another comment), because it seemed to me to be a common thread re: angelics not travelling to Heaven, demons not travelling to Hell, etc. as you might expect, but perhaps "afterlife - analogy" wasn't the best characterization.

[all_adream]

Yea, me, back before I got electrocuted. For some reason, having the physical body semitrashed on the nerve and electrical level sort of shorted me out, so I have pretty much zip abilities in that regard at all now. It used to be humbling and weird to get yanked into situations, awake and also in sleep, where it eventually became clear that someone was praying to get out of deep life-threatening, or life-ending, shit, and then I seemed to be sent/pulled/there as a direct result. To feel like the literal answer to someone's serious prayers is confusing and humbling in a serious way. People used to call me up and thank me for 'saving' them--from overseas, from next door--the day after I had 'saved' them in dreams. A Tibetan lama said that he 'felt safer knowing I was out there'--holy shit. I think things got so extreme that I wouldn't be surprised if I secretly was pretty glad to get wiped off the higher-level map--and it was a weird relief to become headblind, but then, it left me feeling sort of useless.

[all_adream]

Oh, and I think that the term that would apply in this cosmology/context would be 'an emanation' of whatever, like of Jizo Bodhisattva/Ksitigarba, or a dakini, female 'skygoer' being, or 'a protector'/dharmapala. There isn't so much angel stuff otherwise, really--